On Thursday in an Orange County courtroom, Terry Watson, a former agent out of Georgia, pleaded guilty to 13 counts of athlete-agent inducement.
As part of a plea deal a charge of obstruction of justice was dropped.
Watson, who was portrayed by his attorney as someone who “got in over his head,” was aggressively recruiting clients and gave money, plane tickets and hotel rooms to Greg Little, Marvin Austin and Robert Quinn back in 2010.
There are a few things to consider here.
First is the simple fact that this is just another part of the UNC scandal. It never seems to end or be resolved; it just rolls on and on.
Second is the weirdness of a law that prohibits athletes from talking to agents. The NCAA is a private organization that can regulate itself in any bizarre way it likes. Why does state law play a role?
Having said that, the law is the law and you don’t get to pick and choose what laws you’re going to obey and which you will ignore no matter how stupid the law is. And generally (although not absolutely) speaking, laws which try to prohibit markets, even undesirable markets, fail. There is a stunning amount of money running through “amateur” sports from high school through the autograph tours
As Sammy Davis crooned on Barretta back in the day, don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.
Third is the human story of Watson, who sounds like he may have in fact gotten in over his head and who has now lost pretty much everything.
You really need some Cliff Notes to keep up with all of it. There’s the agent charges, the AFAM fraudulent classes, the PJ Hairston/Fats Thomas situation, the Julius Peppers transcript, the Rashad McCants charges directed at the basketball team and Roy Williams in particular, and that’s just off the top.
It goes on and on.
If you're going to shop Amazon please start here and help DBR
Check out our new T-shirt!| Drop us a line